By Sofia Dash*

Court, a 2014 legal drama by Chaitanya Tamhane, portrays the prejudiced Indian criminal justice system. The multilingual film is set in Mumbai’s Sitladevi slums. It portrays the taxing trial of a 65-year-old folk singer and Dalit activist Narayan Kamble, who was accused of abetting the suicide of a 25-year-old manhole worker, Vasudev Pawar. His song supposedly encouraged manhole workers to commit suicide by disregarding safety equipment if they desired to escape the shackles of society.

The film humanizes Vinay Vora, the accused’s lawyer, Nutan, the public prosecutor, and the Judge, Sadavarte. Court focuses on the Indian legal system’s apathy towards marginalized groups. The victim is a manhole worker who died due to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s deplorable functioning, while the accused is a Dalit caught in a loop of state-sanctioned trials and legal proceedings. This article will analyze the different arguments suggesting the inaccessibility of the Indian legal system for the oppressed classes.

Court delineates how the Indian criminal justice system labels marginalized people as anti-national. Legislations such as Dramatic Performances Act, 1876 (DPA) and Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Amendment Act, 2008 (UAPA) are orthodox and outdated since they work in tandem with India’s extreme sedition laws. The British Raj founded the DPA to regulate Indians’ attempts to incite nationalism against colonial rule. Post-independence, India continued to use this law, with numerous revisions, to restrict the ‘rebellious activities’ of the oppressed who dared to demand their rights. The UAPA, as presented in the film, states “or by any other means of whatever nature … intents to threaten, or likely to threaten the unity, integrity, security or sovereignty of India” (Court 01:38:36-01:39:02). Nutan, the public prosecutor, uses this indisputable ambiguity/loophole in the law to attack Narayan Kamble’s conduct. Vinay Vora, Kamble’s defence counsel, argues that there is no evidence to prove that the workshops he held for folk artists and poets were seditious and anti-national. However, Judge Sadavarte remanded Kamble to judicial custody because the UAPA prohibits bail. The Sessions Court would begin summer vacation the next day, and Kamble would be in detention for a month until trial (Court 01:40:10). Vinay Vohra tried to reason with Judge Sadavarte about Kamble’s old age and deteriorating health, but he was told to approach the High Court if he was in a hurry, despite the fact that the High Court’s backlog of cases is so high that an ageing and ailing person like Kamble might never see the light of day again. This reinforces that “justice delayed is justice denied.”

Court’s cinematographic techniques symbolise the Indian criminal justice system’s disassociation from society. Court’s production staff and camera crew deserve recognition for humanizing the characters whilst giving the film a documentary undertone. In some occasions, the film uses long shots which prolongs the timeframe beyond the scene to emphasize an event. The scene where advocate Vora is attacked by members of the Goyamari cult is prolonged and the camera takes a static view of the outside of the restaurant after all characters have left to emphasize the breach of personal space (Court 01:10:38-01:10:48). This instance can also be seen to fall under the purview of wrongful confinement under Section 340 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) as the attackers restricted Vora and further used physical violence with an intention to cause hurt under Section 319 of IPC. Another instance is where Vasudev Pawar’s widow is cross-examined about her husband’s death (Court 01:14:12) under Section 137 of The Indian Evidence Act, 1872. This scene critiques the lives of manhole workers and the deplorable conditions they work in since the State and municipality fail to provide their employees with safety equipment and protective wear. This in clear violation of the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013which made the employment of any person as a manual scavenger illegal post 2013. Finally, after everyone has left the courtroom, the lights darken (Court 01:43:02). As darkness envelops the courtroom, Kamble falls victim to the nation’s unjust and biased criminal justice system.

Before diving into the conclusion, it’s crucial to highlight that while one may argue that the State is responsible for all its citizens and protects all classes from seditious associations, under Section 124A of IPC, one cannot help but notice that most of these targeted associations come from marginalized areas. India had 326 sedition cases from 2014-2019, however only 6 were convicted. 320 innocent people went through prolonged trials like Kamble before finding justice. As observed in court, several of these instances had stock witnesses like Shankar Bhoir, who testified in four previous cases in the last two years with the same investigating officer (Court 1:25:11). Such stock witnesses are extremely unreliable and looked down upon by the Apex Court, as seen in Prem Chand (Paniwala) v. Union of India and Others. Secondly, although Nutan is a skilled prosecutor, she’s also part of an unfair system. She doesn’t care about the victim’s family or narrative, unlike Vora. She’s sick of seeing the same faces and wants a promotion (Court 53:55). Justice for her means winning a case to ascend the seniority ladder. Vasudev Pawar’s widow was not compensated by the State for her husband’s death, despite it being proven that he suffocated due to a lack of protective equipment and BMC’s negligence.  State and municipal incompetence led to his death.

Corroborating the above arguments, one can conclude that the film Court is a clear manifestation of the biased nature of the Indian criminal justice system and the prevalent discrimination that exists against the marginalized sections of the society. The apathy of the justice system can be seen through the above discussed cases of Vasudev Pawarand Narayan Kamble. The film is a Kafkaesque theatre, considering the relentless oppression, of the marginalized communities, by the formidable authority of the judiciary and the State. It is an accurate manifestation of the dissociation of the justice system from the oppressed classes and how ‘actual justice’ will probably never be delivered in such a society which is plagued by archaic laws and prejudiced mindsets.

Works Cited: Court. Directed by Chaitanya Tamhane, performances by Vira Sathidar, Vivek Gomber, Geetanjali Kulkarni, and Pardeep Joshi, Zoo Entertainment Pvt Ltd, 2014.

* Sofia Dash is a second-year BA LLB (Hons.) student at Jindal Global Law School, O.P. Jindal Global University. She is the Founder and CEO of a social start-up named Elethia Symposium aimed at bridging the gap in education between the privileged and underprivileged.